Active galactic nuclei atz∼ 1.5 – II. Black hole mass estimation by means of broad emission lines

Abstract

This is the second in a series of papers aiming to test how the mass ($M_{\rm BH}$), accretion rate ($\dot{M}$) and spin ($a_{*}$) of super massive black holes (SMBHs) determine the observed properties of type-I active galactic nuclei (AGN). Our project utilizes a sample of 39 unobscured AGN at $z\simeq1.55$ observed by VLT/X-shooter, selected to map a large range in $M_{\rm BH}$ and $L/L_{\rm edd}$ and covers the most prominent UV-optical (broad) emission lines, including H$\alpha$, H$\beta$, MgII, and CIV. This paper focuses on single-epoch, "virial" $M_{\rm BH}$ determinations from broad emission lines and examines the implications of different continuum modeling approaches in line width measurements. We find that using a "local" power-law continuum instead of a physically-motivated thin disk continuum leads to only slight underestimation of the FWHM of the lines and the associated $M_{\rm BH}\left({\rm FWHM}\right)$. However, the line dispersion $\sigma_{\rm line}$ and associated $M_{\rm BH}\left(\sigma_{\rm line}\right)$ are strongly affected by the continuum placement and provides less reliable mass estimates than FWHM-based methods. Our analysis shows that H$\alpha$, H$\beta$ and MgII can be safely used for virial $M_{\rm BH}$ estimation. The CIV line, on the other hand, is not reliable in the majority of the cases, this may indicate that the gas emitting this line is not virialized. While H$\alpha$ and H$\beta$ show very similar line widths, the mean ${\rm FWHM\left(MgII\right)}$ is about 30% narrower than ${\rm FWHM\left(H\beta\right)}$. We confirm several recent suggestions to improve the accuracy in CIV-based mass estimates, relying on other UV emission lines. Such improvements do not reduce the scatter between CIV-based and Balmer-line-based mass estimates.